This study aimed to clarify the factors associated with death due to other diseases after a gastrectomy for gastric cancer. This retrospective cohort study included consecutive patients who had undergone gastrectomy between April 2008 and June 2018 for primary stage II-III gastric cancer. The primary outcome was other-cause survival. To identify prognostic factors for other-cause survival for univariate analysis, we used a Cox proportional hazard regression model. A total of 512 patients met the inclusion criteria. The average age was 67.93 years, and the average body mass index was 22.75 kg/m2, with 84 (16.4%) being moderately malnourished and 88 (17.2%) being severely malnourished, as defined by the Global Leadership Initiative on Malnutrition (GLIM) criteria. The other-cause survival for the malnourished group was significantly worse than that for the normal group (p < 0.001). The prognosis was worse when the severity of malnutrition was worse (p < 0.001). Multivariate analysis showed that severe malnutrition was significantly independent of prognostic factors for other-cause survival (hazard ratio: 3.310; 95% confidence interval: 1.426-7.682; p = 0.005). Undernutrition, as defined by the GLIM criteria, is useful for the preoperative prediction of death due to other diseases after gastrectomy in patients with advanced gastric cancer.
Keywords: body composition; gastric cancer; malnutrition; other-cause survival; prognosis.